The World Wide Web (WWW) is comprised of an expansive network of interconnected computers upon which businesses, governments, groups, and individuals throughout the world maintain inter-linked computer files known as web pages. Users navigate these pages by means of computer software programs commonly known as Internet browsers. Increasingly, users are shopping for products and other goods on the Internet, and companies are attempting to target their advertisements to users based on the users' geographic locations, in order to attract the users' attention to retail, service, or other businesses of potential interest to the users.
Companies allocate a significant budget each year on local advertising in the United States. The majority of this advertising is not directed to the WWW because of the difficulty in determining the physical locations of online users. Tracking an online user has been possible if the user's device for accessing the internet is equipped with a location tracking device such as a GPS device and, optionally, chooses to be tracked.
One conventional technique for obtaining an online user's location without these location tracking devices is through the use of “cookies,” or data created by a Web server and is stored on a user's computer. Cookies provide a way for the Web site to keep track of a user's patterns and preferences and, with the cooperation of the Web browser, to store them on the user's own hard disk. However, cookies require the participation of the user, and unwilling online users can disable the use of cookies on their computers. In addition, online users could enter false data on forms that cookies rely upon.
Geolocation, that is the science of determining the location of a Web site user, is emerging as a new method for discovering the physical location of online users. Geolocation utilizes a common technique called “triangulation,” which refers to the trigonometric operation for finding a position or location by means of bearings from two fixed points that are a known distance apart. Data is sent and received to and from a user's computer from multiple locations. The results are analyzed to triangulate the online user's physical location. As an example, geolocation has been used by companies having servers at various locations around the world that send data signals to Internet addresses, and then analyze the route and time these signals take to reach their destinations.
However, geolocation data provided by geolocation services is narrowly focused. Existing geolocation techniques result in a one-to-one mapping between a network address and a physical location. For instance, one can query the physical location of an Internet Protocol (IP) address and receive the precise physical location of that address, but little information is provided to indicate the physical location of “nearby” addresses as determined from a network point of view.
Geolocation services differ in the resolution of the location data they provide: some may provide merely a country name, while others may return state and city information. As a result, location-based services that use the information provided by geolocation services may face the difficult challenge of dealing with conflicting location data of multi-granularity.
Mobile devices equipped with a TCP/IP stack and a unique address can access the Internet. Additional technologies, such as Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) push, can further the networking capability of mobile devices. WAP is a standard for providing cellular phones, pagers and other handheld devices with secure access to e-mail and text-based Web pages.
As computers diminish in size and mobile devices become more powerful, the differences between them blur. Given the prevalence of mobile devices such as cell phones, the physical location of more and more online users can be determined by geolocation.
In addition to the growing mobile device market, a vast number of online users are equipped with stationary desktop computers. All these computers or devices have the potential to be “located”. With the advent of the geolocation technology comes business opportunities, as well as serious privacy concerns. Online users, if asked, are always free to provide an online site with their geographical locations. The difficulty arises when online users wish to remain anonymous.
A location-based service such as a business wishing to target advertising to a geographic location needs high-quality, coherent location data. The online users need the ability to protect their privacy. Thus, there is need for efficiently providing location information without violating online users' right to privacy, which need has heretofore remained unsatisfied.